Movin to the country, gonna eat me a lot of peaches….

Category Archives: Must Have List

I am a lucky lucky girl! You know how I’ve been gibbering on about my dining table and how I haven’t been able to find something similar on gumtree and woe is me-ing about my expensive taste in stuffs (someone said to me the other day that I have a champagne taste on a beer budget… ain’t that the truth). Weehhelll who’s a lucky gal? oh that would be ME ME ME!! So I found these really cute replica Henry Bertoia barstools that I just couldn’t resist (excellent price and I need barstools) and snapped them up from a lovely lady on Gumtree. I went out at lunch time to get some money as I had to pick the stools up after work and the mall that I went to just happens to have an Early Settler store so I thought I’d juuust pop in and see if I could get an end of financial year stocktake sale bargain (aka a haggle opportunity to get that table price down!).

So I walk in the shop, lusting and slobbering over everything as I go, and start drooling over the table when the sales lady wanders over to see if I could be helped. Oh yes sales lady, yes I surely can. I tell her that I’m interested in the dining table and ask if it’s on sale (which I can clearly see is NOT on sale) and she stops me mid sentence to say “not to sound like a cheesy salesperson but have I got a deal for you!” Cue my heart skipping a beat. She tells me that late yesterday afternoon the exact table I want was put in the clearance section FOR HALF PRICE (!!!!!!!) because it has a crack or something. I barely restrained myself from barging her out of the way and trampling her to a fine pulp in my haste to get over to the clearance section to see what this “crack” is like.

And behold… it was as if the lights dimmed a little and a giant warm yellow spotlight shone on the table. There it was… We had a look around at the table and there is a 4cm long miniscule crack on one end of the oak tabletop AND THAT’S IT!! Nothing a little metal plate underneath and a bit of oak coloured putty won’t fix! HALF PRICE YEAAHHHHH!!!! I didn’t let her finish her sales schpeil and tried not to yell when I blurted out “I’ll take it!”. I may or may not have have glared rabidly like a wild beast protecting her catch at anyone who came near my table… I’ve seem to have conveniently forgotten while I was in my bargain nabbing hazy stupor. So I get my beloved table and only have to pay half and arm and a leg for it. Woohoo!! And bonus awesome replica Henry Bertoia chairs.

So I’m thinking now that I should go buy me a lottery ticket for the lucky 3 trifecta 🙂

You know what I really like? Haggling. Yep. Haggling. The thrill of the chase, the sweaty angst of getting a bargain and the sense of accomplishment when I’ve managed to knock $50 off the overinflated price thankyouverymuch. You know what I really don’t like? When retailers at an “outlet” store don’t let me haggle. Point blank REFUSE to haggle with me. Although the fact that it’s a retail store never stops me as I’ll usually try to haggle on things like appliances or furniture but that’s beside the point. But this was an “outlet” store which implies that the goods should firstly be at a reduced price compared to a normal retail store and secondly be willing to bloody well haggle. This outlet store complex is not known for it’s bustling crowds of frantic purchasers with fistfuls of cash so I would have thought that they’d be at least willing to come to the party and do the discount disco.

But noooooo! I’ve been on the hunt for a particular type of arm chair for a while (yes yes I’m picky) and I’ve been able to find it in a couple of other shops but not in the colour I want or haven’t been able to order it in the colour I want. So the other weekend (in the shop with the wishbone chair!) I found it, in black, just as I’ve been searching for. Sat in it, it was as comfy as I’d thought. Looked at the price tag, nearly dropped dead of a cardiac, $700!!! for a chair!! in an outlet shop!! So I politely asked if that was the best price they could do on the chair and was met with a terse “we don’t feel the need to discount our items” to which I was utterly gobsmacked and actually lost for words (a rarity for me). She tried to placate me by stating they did offer Lay-by but I told her that the money wasn’t an issue as I could pay her in full now but I just wasn’t prepared to pay $700 for a chair. As lovely and enticing as it was.

Even after this exchange (to which I’d wanted to reply “well bugger off then you hoity toity bish”) she tried to aggressively sell me the chair as I browsed other items in the shop, trying to gracefully exit and barely restraining my intense need to dramatically storm out of the shop swearing never to return. “We do have lay-by…” she’d sing-song at me, “it’ll fit in the truck”… far out lady. If you don’t come to my party and I walk away, take a hint and realise that I’m not coming to yours.

I can’t say I’ve ever had a point blank refusal to even discuss a discount when I’ve tried to haggle and I wasn’t quite sure how to handle it. At least my brain/mouth filter kicked in and I wasn’t escorted from the shop by burly security guards. But really, am I that wrong to expect at least a little discount discussion? A little price wrangling in exchange for my desired and most lusted after goods? Even the outlet centre’s website promises “great stores, great brands, great discounts”. Pffft no discounts here mate. I’m not sure if you’ve ever seen Kath & Kim and seen the skits with Prue and Trude in their “premier homewares store” but that’s what this lady was like (and there was a Trude standing behind the counter too). YouTube it as there are a few skits there if you haven’t seen it.

And the thing that pisses me off the most? The fact that that is the ONLY FARKING STORE that I’ve seen my chair in… even my beloved eBay hasn’t proffered the goods. And I’ve been looking for a good six bloody months. Apart from being bamboozled by her response I wanted to chuck a full on screaming and kicking tanty on the floor and scream “but WHHHHHHYYYYYYYYYYYYY!!” :). I believe in second chances so I’m going to go back and give them one last chance to take my money. But I’ll be walking away with my discounted chair or drowning my sorrows and scouring eBay for the gazillionth time *shakes fist at eBay*.

Some things I forgot to include in my Ikea post (I was all afluster with the Ikea goodness):

One of the things I really wanted to get from Ikea was this grandfather clock wall decal. They have a nifty clock that can be purchased to go with it but I already have one which would go nicely. Thought it was seriously cool and for $15 bucks it’s on my gotta have list!

The other is either (or both?!) of these nifty chalkboard stickers. Seriously how awesome are they??? Functional and gorgeous… It’ll probably cost me just as much to ship it to me (hmmm could that be a good excuse to further browse the shop and make the shipping worth while?? heheh ;} )

Oh and did I mention that I learned how to crochet granny squares over the Christmas break? Just to get myself into the spirit of my impending bumpkin life 🙂 Almost have enough to make a blankie!

And just a quick update on the new land situation. I spoke to my council guy again on Friday to clarify everything and it is possible BUT I’d have to be the land owner for the council to release the surrounding land owners details to be able to get consent for the right of way road (which I need to be able to register it). AND I’d also have to get permission from everyone who is “burdened” or “benefited” by the road which basically means any land owner whose block the road runs through or anyone who uses the road… and that could be a lot considering I can see at least 8 blocks that the road runs through but I’m not sure if that means all users of the road because there is a little sub road running off it which contains another 3 residences. So I might need all their permission too! So basically I need to firstly go out there and see if it is suitable and then work out what to do after that. Even if I did get all their permission, I’m still not guaranteed to get a building entitlement as it will depend on my development application (which I’m pretty sure will tick all their boxes). So it’s all a bit of a gamble. Not gonna stress myself out just yet… need to see it in person first… even if from photos and google earth it looks perfect :).

Next topic is bedrooms… have been doing a lot of surfing and planning in the last coupla weeks while work has been quiet. So I’ll show ya what I’ve got planned.

PS. and ooooohh this is post number 30! who would have guessed I could blabber on so much huh?!

Haha you can chalk today’s listing to the wishlist…. Saw the first listing on allhomes and then googled it to try and find out where it was and found the second listing that has more detailed photos of the inside and the price….. think I’m gonna be a bit short on this one… If anyone has $2.85 million spare and wants to give it to me I won’t say no!

Still it ticks two of the three boxes, close to work and lots of good water ;} Not a lot of bushland and the price… hmmmmm oh well!

More reading of that straw bale house blog and looking into Waffle pods (mmmm wafffffles) and again I’ve learned something helpful. http://www.wafflepod.com/engineer/ Bloody good idea! Better insulated concrete slab, minimal environmental impact although dunno bout the cost so I’ll have to find out. I really need to get in touch with these bloggers to see how they’re doing and how their systems are holding up. 🙂